Ceticultsot
Beautiful, moving film.
Forumrxes
Yo, there's no way for me to review this film without saying, take your *insert ethnicity + "ass" here* to see this film,like now. You have to see it in order to know what you're really messing with.
Curt
Watching it is like watching the spectacle of a class clown at their best: you laugh at their jokes, instigate their defiance, and "ooooh" when they get in trouble.
Robert J. Maxwell
I haven't followed baseball since I was a child. The only sport that's ever interested me is trying to get out of bed in the morning. But this is a movie that convulsed me as a youth and that I still enjoy watching, along with "The Natural" and "Damn Yankees" (except for Tab Hunter, a black hole in any production).Ray Milland is quite good as a slightly aged-in-the-wood chemistry graduate student and professor. He loves his work; he loves his girl, Jean Peters. The only problem is that through the Spring and Summer he's distracted by baseball, which he monitors religiously.One of those lab accidents takes place that produces an unidentifiable mixture of some white fluid -- about a quart -- that is repelled by wood. Scientist that he is, Milland discovers that rolling a baseball around in the stuff makes it impossible for a wooden bat to hit the ball. The ball leaps like a rabbit before returning to its original trajectory. Milland forces his way onto a major league team, leaving everyone to wonder if he's been kidnapped or become a gangster.It's a raw but engaging comedy. Milland pass off the little bottle of fluid as hair tonic and when anyone borrows it and tries to brush his hair, the hair crackles and tries to escape the brush. Paul Douglas is the catcher who first tries Milland out -- "He ain't got a prayer" -- and then is assigned to keep an eye on him because Milland reads books with titles like "The Atom, The Stars, And The Universe", and "Fundamentals of Ballistics," so he's an odd ball, though a valuable odd ball.Don't expect subtlety or sophistication and you'll enjoy yourself.
dougdoepke
Forget all those great spitball artists of baseball's past. Chemistry professor Simpson (Milland) has come up with a lab substance that guarantees batters will never connect. So what does he do with it. He does what all us baseball fantasists would do—he becomes a major league superstar and gets the girl (Peters) at the same time. Okay, at least we can dream, can't we.Mildly amusing little entry from TCF that qualifies as modern-day Disney fare. Good special effects—I'm still wondering how they got the dipsy-do ball effect in digitally-deprived 1949. Milland has pretty good pitching form for a supposed major-leaguer. Still, It's a bit of a stretch when 42-year old catcher Paul Douglas calls 44-year old Milland "kid". I'm guessing TCF producers went for the over-age actor for his marquee value 3 years after the Oscar for Lost Weekend.Good supporting cast. Douglas supplies the comedy as the lovable roughneck, as good at fracturing English grammar as he is at catching the ball. Then there's the un-lovable roughneck Ted de Corsia as the tough-talking team manager, along with the omnipresent Ray Collins who seems to have been in every-other movie made during this period. And, of course, there's the winsome Jean Peters. In real life, she even got the notoriously elusive billionaire Howard Hughes to actually slip a ring on her finger. Seeing her here, I can understand why.No, this minor exercise in baseball fantasy was not going to win an Oscar for anyone. Charming as it is in an old-fashioned way, the movie lacks director Bacon's usual snappy way with comedy material—he may not have been comfortable with the sports theme. Nonetheless, it remains a pleasant two-base hit for those of us overloaded on today's hard- swinging movie fare that too often pops out.
JimSDCal
"Field of Dreams" is the best baseball fantasy yet filmed, followed closely by "The Natural". In this picture, Prof. Vernon Simpson (Ray MIlland) invents a chemical which makes any object avoid wood. This property is invaluable to baseball pitchers who wish that their pitches avoid contact by batters. Simpson, tests his invention himself as he gets himself hired by the St. Louis baseball team. Their is decent comedy in this movie as Simpson tries to hide the reason for his success from his teammates, such as Monk (Paul Douglas), and his manager, Jimmy Dolan. The reason Simpson has for pitching, in addition to proving that his invention works, is to earn money so he can marry his girlfriend Debbie (Jean Peters), but he wants her not to find out why he has departed his college campus. I like this movie, it would probably play better during spring training, not the dead of winter, so it get a grade of C+ and a modest recommendation.
caa821
This is a fanciful story, nostalgic now, with its presenting the baseball milieu as it was several decades ago, and presents several likable actors, now gone, led by Milland and Douglas.Robert Redford, Kevin Costner, Tom Berenger, Charlie Sheen - and a couple of other actors - can handle throwing, fielding and hitting a baseball competently, and are able to convey an ability at a level to warrant the character they've been hired to portray.However, in past flicks, the macho Gary Cooper and Jimmy Stewart, who played "men's men" many times over, couldn't play baseball for sour apples; and Tony Perkins was even worse. However, Milland and Paul Douglas are so inept it is doubtful they would stand-out if participating as members of a T-ball team.But it is enjoyable as a nostalgic piece of cornball comedy, with an engaging cast no longer with us. A 7-* decent piece of entertainment.
